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Empire of Aristum
The Empire of Aristum once spread across the continent of Harad Talath - a vast expanse of cities and towns all pledging fealty to one ruler - the Emperor. How he ruled such a vast domain remains unclear, with only rumors and speculations (which herein are documented). It is said that the Emperors of Aristum employed a “Secret Service” of assassins and spies who kept tabs on all of the noble families, and anyone else who became of “note” - merchants, guild leaders, clergy. Using powerful magics, they recorded and co-ordinated a vast security state, crushing political opposition and quelling any discontent. For nearly 1,000 years, the Empire came to dominate all life on the continent of Harad Talath. While the Fae Folk tended to keep to themselves, they could not escape the notice of the Empire. Elves and Dwarves, Hobbits and Gnomes, all found their communities either dominated or suppressed by the Empire of Aristum. The Elves retreated into their forest strongholds, and the Dwarves and Gnomes dove deep into the Earth, but the hobbits suffered under the Empire, mostly under the weight of impoverishing tributes required annually. Resentment against the Empire ran deep, but as long as they had the “Great Library” at Aristum, where the Secret Service employed powerful wizards to keep tabs on everyone, no one could even plan a move against the empire. A vast array of spies and assassin, supplemented by powerful Wizards using arcane magic, would root out any disloyalty and allow the Emperor's Security Forces to respond while any resistance was still in its infancy. That was, until the creation of The Amulets. The Amulets were intended by the Imperial Family as a safeguard against their own Secret Service, whom the Emperor had come to fear. Wizards whom the Emperor considered loyal were tasked with the creation of just a dozen amulets - all for the exclusive use of the Royal Family. The Amulets guard against all forms of Magic, and would prevent the “meddling” of the Wizards and Spymasters in the Imperial family’s business. The Emperor had chosen poorly. One of the Mages, a young Sorcerer named Felix Brentmoor, found himself as the point of contact between the King and the Master Wizards working on the project. Not able to help with the creation of the amulets himself, he was used by the conspirators as a go-between. He should not have been trusted. Unknown to both the Emperor and the Master Wizards, Felix changed the order from 12 - just enough to cover the immediate Imperial Family - to 13. The change was not considered unusual by the Wizards, who assumed the Emperor had just enlarged his circle of recipients. The Amulets were delivered, and Felix held one back. Neither the Emperor, nor the wizards were any wiser. Felix had already anticipated the Emperor’s next move, and he went straight to the head of the Imperial Secret Service with the extra amulet as the Emperor was eliminating the team of wizards who had created them, burning their library, and trying to cover all knowledge of the Amulets’ existence. The revelation of the Amulets proved the fatal blow to the Emperor’s power. The head of the Secret Service, Spymaster T’cal assumed the amulets were ordered to hide the Emperor’s intentions towards his own intelligence service. T’cal began to plot the recovery and destruction of the amulets while the Emperor began to search for Felix - his absence being noted at the purge of the Master Wizards’ keep. Felix fled Aristum just as the Spymaster began his recovery efforts. A civil war erupted between the those loyal to the Spymaster and those loyal to the Emperor. The details of the war are lost, but what is known is that the conflict so crippled the capabilities of the Secret Service that - once the Emperor’s rule was again undisputed - he found himself facing a general uprising. The Empire collapsed, the Library was razed, and the Imperial family nearly all put the sword.